Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi, known to the cricketing world as ‘Tiger’, represented India in 46 Tests and scored 2,793 runs, inclusive of six centuries (Caricature by Austin Coutinho)

New Delhi: Feb 6, 2013

The BCCI today instituted an annual lecture to honour the memory of late former India skipper Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi which would be inaugurated by the legendary Sunil Gavaskar on February 20 in Chennai.

“The inaugural Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi Memorial Lecture will be delivered by cricketing legend Sunil Gavaskar on Wednesday, 20 February 2013, at the Taj Coromandel, Chennai,” the BCCI said in a statement.

“The annual lecture will be a part of the Indian Cricket season. It has been envisaged as a forum for a speaker from across the world to share his thoughts on the glorious game, as a way to help evolve it further. The audience will comprise like-minded individuals and other key stakeholders of the sport,” it added.

Pataudi, known to the cricketing world as ‘Tiger’, represented India in 46 Tests from 1961-62 to 1974-75, and scored 2,793 runs, inclusive of six centuries.

He captained the national side in 40 Tests, and was in charge when India registered their first-ever Test series win on foreign soil, in New Zealand in 1967-68.

“He was one of those who with his accomplishments and encouragement to the country’s junior cricketers in the 1960s, helped lay the foundation for India’s rise as a cricketing power in the subsequent decades,” BCCI secretary Sanjay Jagdale said in the statement.

“The memorial lecture will be a humble recognition of his contribution to the sport.”

The BCCI’s decision comes after Pataudi’s widow, actress Sharmila Tagore, wrote a letter to Board President N Srinivasan in which she criticised the delay in instituting the lecture.

She had also demanded that last year’s India-England series be named after Pataudi but the BCCI had expressed its inability to do that as the series was known as Anthony De Mello Trophy, the first BCCI secretary, since 1951.

First Published on February 6, 2013, 2:32 pmLast updated on February 6, 2013, 2:32 pm